As the primary loss of Representative Liz Cheney – confirmed on Tuesday night – loomed, the speculation over what’s next for the never-Trump Republican was already growing.
On Tuesday, Rep Cheney lost to Trump-backed Harriet Hageman, who by the latest poll estimates from the Casper Star-Tribune was leading the three-term congresswoman from Wyoming by more than 20 points.
Indeed, in her final campaign video released last Thursday, Ms Cheney’s closing argument resonated more as a public notice that she, and the rest of the Republican Party for that matter, would not be defeated by Trumpism.
“America cannot remain free if we abandon the truth. The lie that the 2020 presidential election was stolen is insidious — it preys on those who love their country,” Ms Cheney said in the closing-argument clip. “It is a door Donald Trump opened to manipulate Americans to abandon their principles, to sacrifice their freedom, to justify violence, to ignore the rulings of our courts and the rule of law.
“This is Donald Trump’s legacy, but it cannot be the future of our nation.”
And in a powerful concession speech condeming the former president’s “poisonous lies” about the 2020 election, she said: “I will do whatever it takes to ensure that Donald Trump is never anywhere near the Oval Office and I mean it. I love my country more.”
With that in mind, here are several possible next moves for the 56-year-old congresswoman could make. From a widely speculated launch for president in 2024, to swinging through the revolving door of politics to prime-time cable, here’s where we might see Ms Cheney land.
Sounding the alarm on Trumpism
While she entered Congress six years ago known most prominently as the daughter of former vice president Dick Cheney and being a vociferous critic of the Obama-Biden administration, she will likely find herself leaving her post being best known for her scathing dressing downs of another former president: Donald Trump.
While Ms Cheney voted in line with Mr Trump nearly 93 per cent of the time, she has lately been focussed on ensuring the twice-impeached president never returns to the position of commander-in-chief.
“A man as dangerous as Donald Trump can absolutely never be anywhere near the Oval Office ever again,” Ms Cheney said in an interview with ABC’s Jonathan Karl last month, adding that she doesn’t see a way out for the Republican party to “survive” if he does indeed pull off a second term. “Those of us who believe in Republican principles and ideals have a responsibility to try to lead the party back to what it can be.”
Ms Cheney’s criticism of Mr Trump has also extended to the GOP as a whole.
Elected officials have “made themselves willing hostages to this dangerous and irrational man”, Ms Cheney said in June while speaking at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library.
“But the reality that we face today as Republicans — as we think about the choice in front of us — we have to choose. Because Republicans cannot both be loyal to Donald Trump and loyal to the Constitution.”
The three-term congresswoman has even gone so far as to rope her father into calling out the former president, including him in a now-viral video where the Bush-era politician proclaims while staring dead-eyed into the camera that “there has never been an individual who is a greater threat to our republic than Donald Trump.”
A bid for president in 2024
Of all the possible political avenues that Ms Cheney could explore now she has lost her primary, one is the possibility that the conservative would make a bid for an even higher office: the presidency.
During that same ABC interview, Ms Cheney addressed her feelings on making a run for the Oval Office.
“I haven’t made a decision about that yet, and I’m obviously very focused on my reelection, I’m very focused on the Jan 6 committee, I’m very focused on my obligations to do the job I have now,” she said. “And I’ll make a decision about ’24 down the road.”
“But I think about it less in terms of a decision about running for office and more in terms of, you know, as an American and as somebody who’s in a position of public trust now, how do I make sure that I’m doing everything I can to do the right thing? To do what I know is right for the country and to protect our Constitution?” she added.
Republican analysts, however, contend that never-Trump conservatives could be willing and likely to throw their support behind a Cheney 2024 ticket.
Dmitri Mehlhorn, who advises donors across the political spectrum who are opposed to a second term for Mr Trump, told The Washington Post that he believes the same people he works with would be keen to back a Cheney presidential bid.
“That chatter was very strong even before that Dick Cheney commercial,” he said, referring to the since viral campaign ad that included the former vice president.
“My speculation is that she will set up her own 501(c)(3) and/or 501(c)(4), a new PAC, etc, and start raising money for 2022 and 2024,” said a Republican at the Heritage Foundation in an interview with The New Republic on the matter. “As the presidential primary season approaches, she will test the waters, test where the money is going, etc., and consider tossing her (cowboy) hat in the ring. If she decides not to run, she will use her PAC money to support non-Trump candidates in 2022 and 2024.”
Launching a think-tank
In 2009, Ms Cheney launched Keep America Safe – alongside fellow conservatives William Kristol, who served as chief of staff to the vice president in the George H W Bush administration, and lawyer Debra Burlingame, whose brother was killed when the plane he was piloting, American Airlines Flight 77, was hijacked and crashed into the Pentagon on 9/11.
That organisation advocated for policy positions that were frequently championed by the Bush-Cheney administration, which included a fierce opposition to the shutting down of Guantanamo Bay, ending the investigations into the CIA’s interrogation methods and expanding the US war in Afghanistan.
However, as well-worn a path it may be for politicians to cruise from Capitol Hill to the nearby DC think-tanks, some of those close to Ms Cheney view that specific revolving door being a closed for the never-Trump Republican.
“I think it’s less likely than people think that she’s going to retreat to a think tank,” said her former think-tank board member Mr Kristol in an interview with The New Republic. “I just think she’s going to be a little more political than a think tank role would suggest.”
A pivot to cable news or book deal
Before officially launching a presidential bid, candidates will often test the waters by publishing a tell-all memoir that – more or less – creates the narrative around their bid for the White House and will also include platitudes and vagaries about their political agendas alongside unconfirmed and unannounced platforms (see: Democratic 2016 presidential candidates Elizabeth Warren’s “A Fighting Chance” and Bernie Sanders “Our Revolution: A Future to Believe In” and Republican candidate Ted Cruz’s “A Time for Truth”).
According to The New Republic, that path could be on the horizon for Ms Cheney, along with a hefty seven-figure book advance.
Cable news could also be an option for Ms Cheney. CNN has frequently tapped the expertise of former Trump loyalist and ex-New Jersey governor Chris Christie, while CBS recently hired former Trump chief of staff Mick Mulvaney as a political contributor and former Trump National Security Adviser HR McMaster as a foreign policy contributor. Ms Chceney’s conservative credentials could help balance out liberal perspectives on either MSNBC or CNN.
January 6 committee
The line in the sand between Ms Cheney and her fellow GOP members was first drawn when she cast her vote to impeach Mr Trump for his actions during the January 6 insurrection, a decision that led to her being censured by her own state’s Republican Party. She later became one of only two GOP members to sit on the Democrat-appointed House committee investigating the events leading up to and during the Capitol riot. She serves as vice-chair of the panel.
Though the blockbuster summer hearings have come and gone, the so-called “dam” of information that has since broken has led the committee to schedule a new lineup of public hearings likely beginning in September.
Ms Cheney confirmed as much during the final summertime broadcast on 21 July, stating that the committee “will spend August pursuing emerging information on multiple fronts before convening multiple hearings this September.”
Speaking to CNN’s Jake Tapper recently, however, Ms Cheney confirmed that: “We anticipate talking to additional members of the president’s Cabinet. We anticipate talking to additional members of his campaign. Certainly, we’re very focused as well on the Secret Service.”
On the point of criminal charges against Mr Trump being recommended to the Justice Department for his role in the January 6 mob, Ms Cheney has kept mostly mum on the point. She conceded during a wide-ranging interview with ABC that she and her colleagues on the panel have not necessarily ruled out making a recommendation of criminal charges.
“The single most important thing is protecting the nation from Donald Trump,” she said, while adding that the Justice Department need not rely on the committee’s referral, as it makes its own decisions around pressing criminal charges.
